Thanks but No Thanks

At some point everyone over 50 decides that it’s time to downsize. The reasons vary, but often it’s when boomers come to the realization that their living space is much too large after the children have (finally, in some cases) left the nest. And they wonder why they have so much stuff. Time spent caring for that stuff could be better utilized elsewhere.

            Many of us don’t just accumulate, we collect. Case in point, I love things made of copper. Over the years, I regularly added to my collection whenever something made of copper caught my attention. The end result was a rather large eclectic assortment of interesting pieces, but of little use except for a few select pans. One day, prior to a move, I realized that, like it or not, I had to trim it. After I ascertained that my children had absolutely no interest in getting any of the pieces (Thanks, Mom, but no thanks), I got rid of my collection gradually, keeping only a few favourites. It felt good and it cleared a lot of space in my kitchen where it was displayed.

            One other thing I have accumulated over the years is books. I love to read, and I held on to most of those books until, that is, one day I realized that apart from a few, a lot of them were outdated because research is ever expanding. Fiction ones, except for the more classic titles, of course, were also dated. It was time to do something. After a bit of research I found an organization that ships books to Third World countries, and it made me happy to donate of lot of my books to them. Today, I exchange books within a group of friends, so I have stopped accumulating.

            I found it interesting that my children, and yours as well I’m sure, seem to have little desire in getting any of old “stuff”. Tastes change over the generations, and while many of us were proud to wash our exquisite “Sunday” plates by hand, our children only want dishes that can be loaded into the dishwasher. Please, Mom, no washing by hand! And certainly nothing that needs to be polished.

            So what to do with our silver, china, etc? Sell them ourselves or contact antique dealers because while our children say: Thanks, but no thanks, there are many collectors of all stripes out there, and the cycle can be renewed.